The Roaring Fork hosts many kinds of mayflies but you only need to worry about three species: Green Drakes, Pale Morning Duns, and Blue-winged Olives. Blue-winged Olives are the first and last mayflies of the year and provide the longest, most predictable hatches on the river. You first see these tiny slate-winged mayflies in mid March, and can expect to see them nearly every afternoon until the middle of May, when heavy runoff spoils the river. You find them again in the fall starting in late September through November, when the water is low and clear. The fish are wary in the low water, and after a summer of being fished over, they aren't easy. They do, however, have to put on the feedbag before winter sets in, and if you have the right presentation and fly pattern (in that order) you can have some glorious afternoons.
Green Drakes often hatch near or after dark on the Roaring Fork and big large trout to the surface to feed.
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Olives on the Roaring Fork range from #16 to #20 and are typically larger in the spring than in the fall. The best hatches happen late on really lousy afternoons when a low front is moving through. Just when you think you endured a day of rain or snow and wind for nothing, someone throws a switch and you find a pod of trout that has been waiting for the hatch, just like you have. For Olives, I prefer low-riding patterns like the Compara-dun, Sparkle Dun, or a parachute pattern. My favorite has an olive quill body and gray poly-yarn wing, but on really dark days, a Parachute Adams with a black calf-tail or poly-yarn wing is much easier to see on the water.
The marquis event on the Roaring Fork is the Western Green Drake hatch, and while it draws quite a few anglers, the big water and drift-boat fishing in the lower river spreads the pressure, so you don't get the kind of traffic you see on other famous Green Drake waters like the nearby Frying Pan or the Henry's Fork. And while the Green Drake hatch on other Rocky Mountain streams is mainly a cloudy afternoon affair, Green Drakes on the Fork have a peculiar habit of hatching in the late evening or right at dark.
The first time I fished the Roaring Fork, my buddy and I drifted the lower river sometime near the Fourth of July, casting #10-12 Green Drake Hairwing Duns from a driftboat. We caught fish regularly and were surprised by a few especially big trout that cannonballed our flies unexpectedly in fast, deep water, but we didn't see anything I'd call a hatch. We dawdled too much that day I guess, because when dark came on, we were still a couple of miles from the boat ramp and still throwing drake patterns. As soon as the sun went down, we began to hear and see fish rising all over the river. We pulled over and fished the rocky shoreline, feeling our way along the slippery bottom, and casting at slurping and sucking sounds out in the darkness. That first night I had no idea what was out there--I was just happy to be catching fish--but in subsequent evenings we were able to verify that there were actually Green Drakes out in the gloaming, and I've since learned that the local guides start late, and stay late, during Green Drake season for exactly that reason.
Wilton Jaffe Park near the Upper Woody Creek Bridge (shown above) offers walk-in access to several miles of river and excellent fishing.
Of course, Green Drakes also hatch on cloudy afternoons--sometimes in concentrations that will bring fish to the surface--and even on clear, sunny days in early July, you can fish a Green Drake imitation all day and usually catch enough trout to make it worthwhile. If you really want to catch a lot of fish, however, you'll have to go down after them with a #12-14 Prince Nymph or 20 Incher. Green Drakes start on the Roaring Fork about the third week of June, and while you can find them on the river nearly all summer, the best fishing generally occurs during the first two weeks of July.
Roy Palm, owner of Frying Pan Anglers, has been fishing the Green Drake hatch on the Roaring Fork for nearly 40 years and has developed some of the best Green Drake patterns in the West. Roy's Biot Henwing is his Green Drake of choice, and it has fooled many finicky trout over the years. The guides fish with oversized Royal Wulffs and H&L Variants because the contrasting wing colors make the fly easy to see at dusk.
The third species in the Roaring Fork triad of mayflies is the Pale Morning Dun (PMD)--oddly named because I usually find them hatching in the early afternoon. The PMD hatch coincides roughly with the Green Drake hatch. You can find them on the river from the end of June through September, with the heaviest hatches and the best feeding usually in the first few weeks of the emergence. Roaring Fork PMDs can be quite small (#16-#20) and have a definite pink cast to them. A. K. Best's Melon Quill is a beautiful and effective pattern here. Low-riding patterns like a Compara-dun, Sparkle Dun, or a parachute pattern are also very effective if tied in light pink hues.
After the PMD duns hatch and fly to bankside cover, they molt and return to the river as dark-bodied spinners with clear wings and long tails. They gather over the river, mate, and die, creating a late evening banquet that can make the river boil with trout rises. A #18-20 Rusty Spinner with Antron wings will take fish in this situation, but you have to get the fly right in front of the trout and strike quickly when the fish closes on the it--and that's asking a lot in the darkness. It's a fascinating and frustrating pursuit that can keep you on the river until long after dark.
While mayflies always seems to get the most attention from anglers, caddisflies on this river are the most prolific aquatic insects, and trout depend on them for food more than any others. This is a river where you can catch trout on caddis imitations all year--deep-running larva imitations in the winter, and pupa and adults in the summer. A well-prepared Roaring Fork angler will carry a lot of different caddis imitations for different situations.
Caddis start the season with an enormous emergence of Brachycentrus in late April and early May that many folks call the Mother's Day hatch. The good fishing lasts until high water hits in mid May and then starts up again with less intensity when the water drops in late June. Caddis fishing lasts all summer long and well into the fall, ending near the start of October. The caddis range in color from slate gray (Mother's Day hatch) to tan, brown, and sometimes olive bodies. Carry sizes 12 to 18.
When trout are taking caddis on the surface, I'm partial to Craig Mathews's X-Caddis. In flat water later in the season, the King River Caddis or Henryville Special are very good choices. When caddis are emerging, trout can be crazy about a simple Renegade, but I've never been able to figure out why.
For nymph fishing, a lot of caddis patterns will work, especially small beadhead patterns. Scott Sanchez's Glass House Caddis and Gary LaFontaine's Deep Sparkle Pupa and Emergent Sparkle Pupa are three of my favorites. Try whatever works on your local caddis hatches, and you'll be pleasantly surprised.
From November to March, the Roaring Fork is mostly a midge river, and while you can always catch fish on Prince Nymphs or other mayfly and stonefly imitations, your best bets are smaller midge larvae and pupae imitations--especially when midges are obviously hatching. Small (#18-#22) Copper Johns, Brassies, Yong Specials, or almost any other midge pattern will do as long as you try to match the general size and color. Most of the midges you see will be red, olive, cream, or brown. On a warm, overcast day in the late fall or early spring, you can sometimes find pods of fish rising to adult midges in the large, slow pools where the trout hold over for the winter. Any small hook with a sparse wrapping of hackle, like a Griffith's Gnat or Fore-and-Aft midge cluster, will work. Just remember that the trout are cold and slow, and you'll likely have to put the fly right on their noses.
The Roaring Fork has a good population of stoneflies as well. Small (#10-12) dark ones hatch in April and May, and a few big salmonflies (#6-8) emerge in late May and early June when the river is normally peaking from snowmelt. Golden stones hatch sporadically on cloudy days in June, July, and August. You can see them buzzing around in the mornings almost any day of the summer, and a #8-12 Yellow Stimulator thrown tight to the bank from a boat is always a good way to start the day. If you drop a small Prince Nymph below your dry fly, you'll be covering all the bases.
The Yellow Sally may not be the biggest stonefly on the river, but it's certainly the most prolific. Sometimes the afternoon and evening hatches in late June and early July can be so thick novices mistake Yellow Sallies for caddisflies. A light-colored X-Caddis (no hackle) will catch trout during this hatch, but the "secret weapon" for this hatch is a #16-18 Flint's Stone.
If you want to get serious about nymphing this river, you can have great fishing almost any day of the year. Tim Heng, general manager of Taylor Creek Flyshop in Basalt, says (with a wink) that his favorite hatch on the Roaring Fork is the "Prince Nymph hatch." He says the Prince Nymph is the #1 pattern on the river all year round, and most of the other guides and outfitters I talk to agree. Heng fishes them in #8-18--smaller flies on the upper river, and in the winter, larger flies in the lower river when green drakes and stoneflies are on the move. Another local favorite is the 20 Incher, and just about any other nymph pattern with peacock herl in it will work as well. Use a strike indicator, a 6- to 9-foot leader, a small split-shot 12 inches above your fly, and dead-drift your fly through likely feeding water. You'll catch a lot of whitefish in the lower river, but there will be some big trout mixed in as well.
Ross Purnell is content director for the Fly Fisherman web site. He lived in Fort Collins, CO, when he wrote this article.
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